Manzai Taikoki

まんざいたいこうき

Aired: 1981

A theatrical anime film produced by Tokyo Movie Shinsha (now TMS Entertainment) and distributed by Shochiku. Co-directed by Takaharu Sawada and Hideo Takayashiki, this offbeat retelling of the rise of Toyotomi Hideyoshi - one of the great unifiers of feudal Japan - takes its inspiration from the early-80s manzai stand-up comedy boom: rather than employing standard voice actors, all the major historical figures (Hideyoshi himself, Oda Nobunaga, Akechi Mitsuhide, Tokugawa Ieyasu and more) are dubbed by then-popular manzai duos including The Bonchi (Osamu and Masato Satomi) and Shinsuke & Ryusuke (Shinsuke Shimada and Ryusuke Matsumoto). The result is a unique experimental work in which Japan's most famous biographical saga is replayed in rapid-fire Osakan comedic dialect, a genuinely unusual artifact of Kansai comedy culture invading the world of historical anime. Released as a double bill with 'Manga Hana no Kakaricho.'